St. Theophan the Recluse on the Clearing of our Mind

Sincere faith is the renunciation of your own mind. It is necessary to make your mind naked and present it like a clean chalkboard to faith, so that she can draw herself on it like she is, without any admixture of foreign sayings and attitudes. When the mind’s own attitudes remain within it, then, after the attitudes of faith are written on it, there appears a mixture of attitudes. The mind will be confused, encountering contradictions between the actions of faith and the sophistries of the mind. Thus are all who approach the region of faith with their own sophistries… They are confused in the faith, and nothing comes of it but harm.

St. Theophan the Recluse,

(Thought for Every Day of the Year, 11.04)